If cards were people? Help

[Onajourney]

Hi 👋

 

iv just began my journey into learning about tarot and all that surrounds it. 
I have a question that I can’t find an answer to, maybe I’m asking the wrong question. So I thought I would turn to a forum to see if any one can help. 
 

So I often see things like imagine if  (example) the knight of swords was a person. How do you feel about them.. 

how can I find out the personality of all the cards 

 

thank you 

[gregory]

Basically by spending time with each card. You might find this book helpful:

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tarot-Playbook-Connect-Cowles-published/dp/B016EAWPDY/ref=sr_1_2?

 

Trying to do exactly that is one of the exercises in there - and the other exercises will also help you get to know each card. And - it's tremendous fun and genuinely valuable - Cowles knows her stuff..,

[DanielJUK]

Welcome to the forum @Onajourney, if you ever feel would like to introduce yourself, you are welcome to start a thread in our introductions section here 🙂 

I don't think this thread is about the history of tarot or Historical Tarot decks and so I have moved it from the Historical Tarot section to the Tarot Talk & Technique area which is the perfect place to discuss techniques and methods for reading and learning the cards.

 

About this topic, it's really useful to learn the personality of each card as well as thinking about the place it could be and a positive and negative meaning of each. But this takes work and exploring every card, like @gregory said. It's a matter of working through the cards and thinking about each one. Often the card image shows their personality, maybe riding fast as a Knight or slowly, perhaps they are handsome and a whirlwind or slow and loyal and practical.

 

There are some nice ideas about their characters/ personalities  from these two sites of meanings:-

https://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/learn/meanings/

http://www.learntarot.com/cards.htm (this site is ancient and doesn't have https yet, so ignore / override any browser warnings, it is safe)

 

 

 

[Onajourney]

Thank you both.

 

i will check these links out.I really appreciate it.  
and thank you for removing and putting my post in the right place. I couldn’t figure out where would be best. And I will introduce my self properly at some stage. I just had to get the question out and start looking in the right direction. So thank u 

[DanielJUK]

@Onajourney when you get to 5 posts you can ask specifically about the personality / characteristics of a card and get opinions in this section.....

https://www.thetarotforum.com/forums/forum/98-individual-card-meanings/

It's read-only till you get to 5 posts. Also you can ask for 1 or 2 cards in a thread.

 

Also you can post readings to get second opinions in Personal Tarot Meanings, you will be able to see the reading and exchange areas at 5 posts 🙂 

[Onajourney]

Amazing. I haven’t had a chance to read about the forum yet but I’m looking forward to it 

[FindYourSovereignty]

12 hours ago, Onajourney said:

So I often see things like imagine if  (example) the knight of swords was a person. How do you feel about them.. 

how can I find out the personality of all the cards 

I did this when I first started learning tarot and found it to be quite an interesting way to connect with each court card. I used the book

Understanding the Tarot Court

 

https://a.co/d/0hvcgVF

 

[Pio2001]

10 hours ago, FindYourSovereignty said:

I did this when I first started learning tarot and found it to be quite an interesting way to connect with each court card.

 

Hello,

I did this too for court cards, following the advice of a tarot reader on Youtube. 

I was a bit confused with the difference between queens and kings. So I tried to associate each of them to a Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings character. Then it became easier. For example, I tried to associate the queen of wands with Theoden, while the king of wands would be Aragorn. 

You may disagree with this choice, of course, there is no right answer. But a least, it give food for thought. What qualities has Theoden that Aragorn has not ? That question is more practical for me than the difference between an "internal energy" (for queens) and an "external energy" (for kings).

Edited March 7, 2024 by Pio2001

[gregory]

I found it much more fun to relate each to people in my own life. Which is one of the many reasons there is only ONE friend I will read for....

[Laura Borealis]

Traditionally the French playing card court cards were associated with figures from mythology and history, . The only one I can remember off the top of my head is the Queen of Swords (or Spades actually) who was associated with Pallas Athena. As the Goddess of Wisdom, that one fits nicely. You could picture a Queen of Swords person as a thinker, cool-headed, a strategist.

 

Paul Huson wrote about the traditional associations in his book The Mystical Origins of Tarot (great book if you want to look at the history of tarot) and I know at least one YouTube guy talked about them in a series on the courts. Unfortunately since the playing card courts are three to a suit, it leaves out the knights. And some of them were people I personally had never heard of so the association was lost on me. It might be more useful anyway to do like Pio2001 and Gregory, and come up with your own based on people you're familiar with. If you want to go that route.

 

What I wouldn't recommend is go the route of some mid-20th systems of "a young boy with fair hair" or "a mature man with dark hair" or whatever. It's far too simplistic and limiting! 😸

[Ix Chel]

@Onajourney Anthony Louis mentions people connected to the cards in his book Tarot Plain and Simple. It is a good book.

 

Court Cards are the most difficult cards. I learned them by watching Television shows like Bones. You can follow the characters for years, and it is fun to connect them to the cards. 

 

There is also a Court Cards study group in this forum. It is always very interesting to see how other people see the cards.

 

The best way to understand Tarot is to start a Tarot Journal and study every card.

[DanielJUK]

ooh great idea from @Ix Chel

You have to think about which court card matches a description, originally from a post on Kelly-Ann Maddox's blog

 

it's here -

https://www.thetarotforum.com/forums/forum/65-60-quirky-court-cards/

 

They are numbered based on her description and you have to match it to a court card.

I have realised the index is broken because the links go to locations on the old forum. We upgraded and the link urls changed. I will update the links on that page sometime to get it all working again 🙂 Will add it to my forum jobs list. For now, just go through them numbered, thread 1. etc

[Onajourney]

9 hours ago, Ix Chel said:

This is what I have been doing. I’m trying to gage an insight from books videos and now forums just to stretch my mind I guess and gain as much understanding. 
I will check that book out 

 

9 hours ago, Ix Chel said: